KathyHare.com

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When Individual Freedom Collides With Public SafetyBy Kathy Hare

When 86 year
old Russell Weller drove his car into a crowded farmer's market in
California killing 10 people and injuring 45, it sparked a national
debate over "when is someone too old to drive."

A week after
Weller's accident, Time Magazine polled readers asking how states should
license older drivers. By far the overwhelming response was to
impose mandatory driving tests at a certain age to determine if an
individual still has the physical and mental capacity to drive.

But the AARP,
which represents a significant block of elderly voters, quickly rallied
to oppose any legislation that would impose mandatory testing based on
age. Maureen Smile, media representative for the AARP in Denver
said, "Individuals age differently, therefore, the AARP believes testing
should be done on an individual basis, when family members or a doctor
suspect an elderly person may no longer be fit to drive."

While Smile's
point that individuals age differently is well taken, the current AARP
policy does little to prevent needless deaths caused by drivers with
age-related health issues.

Plus, with the
Baby Boomer generation on the fast track to old age, relying on doctors
and families to determine when a person should stop driving becomes more
problematic each year.

By 2030, one
out of four drivers in America will be 65 or older. For the safety
of the general public, and to help keep insurance rates down, it makes
sense to impose mandatory age-based driving tests before 25 percent of
all drivers reach an age where most people experience a decline in their
physical or mental abilities.

Bea Crandall,
an active senior citizen in Falcon, asked if there are "any statistics
showing how many seniors kill or maim themselves or others simply
because they are a certain age."

The Insurance
Institute for Highway Safety maintains age-based statistics, which show
that property damage liability claims are higher in the over 70
age-group than in people 25 to 69 years old. And by time a driver
reaches 85 property damage claims increase dramatically.

Drivers over
70, and their passengers, also have soaring death rates, even surpassing
those of drivers under age 25; the age-group which pays the highest
insurance premiums because of their overall accident rate.

While this
fact wasn't obvious in the past, the institute is now looking at
accident rates based on the number of miles driven by all age groups,
and per mile the over 70 age-group experiences more fatalities.
But the institute does caution, "The fragility of seniors may play a
large part in their higher death rates."

However,
unlike the AARP, the Insurance Institute for Highway Safety does urge
states to develop "valid and feasible driver screening tests," to help
decide if seniors need to modify their driving habits or relinquish
their keys.

Certainly,
taking away someone's drivers license is devastating to the individual,
especially in areas of the country like Falcon where little or no public
transpiration is available. A person's independence is immediately
gone and they must rely on the kindness of neighbors and relatives for
their basic transportation needs. So every effort should be made
to extend the time period the elderly can drive, while also protecting
public safety.

Germany, a
country which already has a high percentage of elderly drivers,
conducted a study to see if highway safety improvements could decrease
the number of accidents caused by senior drivers. They found half
of the accidents in which elderly drivers were at fault occurred because
seniors more often disregarded the right of way when making a left hand
turn.

"Green means
go to seniors," the study concluded. Therefore, installing traffic
lights with protected left-hand turn signals has become a top priority
for the German government.

The insurance
institute has taken notice of the German study, and found intersections
without protected left-hand turn signals are also a problem for seniors
in this country. In addition, they found installing pedal
extensions and bigger side and rearview mirrors helps to decrease
accident rates among elderly drivers.

El Paso
County officials recently announced the transportation department will
soon begin installing road signs with larger letters to help senior
drivers.

While all of
these improvements may help extend the time elderly drivers can stay on
the road, we as a society must still decide what to do when individual
freedom collides with public safety.

Deciding when
a driver must give up their keys because they are no longer fit to drive
is too important a decision to be left to the individual or their
families. As driving manuals throughout this country state,
"Driving is a privilege not a right." Therefore, age-based testing
should hardly be considered an infringement of anyone's rights.

Before
supporting efforts by the AARP to stop mandatory testing, seniors should
remember their children and grandchildren would also like to live to a
ripe old age.